i have a e90 bmw sedan with the base system (front doors, under seats and rear parcel shelf)

so I bought a pair of polk audio dxi 400's (4inch) my question is how do I wire it up. im using the exsisting speaker wire as I am not doing an amp just a straight swap. . the oem speaker wire is split into two wires. blue/black and blue/brown. . my question is which one is the positive and which one is the negative. .

also is it best to solder the wire to the new speaker as I cant use the standard speaker wire connector??

Pin 1 is Negative -numbers are molded in at the OEM speaker connector.

Buy these at your dealer and don't cut the OEM wires:

Speaker housing: 61138373583
Speaker housing pins: 61130006664

Quote:

Originally Posted by LT5PLA

hi guys. .

i have a e90 bmw sedan with the base system (front doors, under seats and rear parcel shelf)

so I bought a pair of polk audio dxi 400's (4inch) my question is how do I wire it up. im using the exsisting speaker wire as I am not doing an amp just a straight swap. . the oem speaker wire is split into two wires. blue/black and blue/brown. . my question is which one is the positive and which one is the negative. .

also is it best to solder the wire to the new speaker as I cant use the standard speaker wire connector??

Please read the thread there is a list of known to fit speakers(in the speaker section) and you will
need speaker adapters for most.
I believe Technic is selling adaptors and other hookup kit stuff like his
famous amp harness and factory connectors.
Speakers alone don't offer a lot of improvement in anything but a L7 system
because of weak amplification. In fact your volume will go down if you are replacing the stock 2 ohm speakers with 4 ohm or higher.

In the coupe the speakers that fit are Jehnerts, Focals, and BSW and I don't
think they require adaptors.

How good are your soldering skills?
With soldering you can end up with things like cold solder
joints and high resistance connections.
When you go down the path of hacking up the stock wiring
it can snowball in to a big expensive mess.
It's better to keep things clean and the best way to do it is use
factory connectors. I would use crimp on's and add solder
if you want to at strategic points also heat shrink tubing over the solder joints.

The C5-400cm looks like they would work just fine. Ignore the JL grille, it won't be installed in this case, so the speaker only has 41 mm depth.

I did some reading and while there are few reviews of this particular driver, I found one of the prominent audiophiles on another forum give it very high marks, plus the 653 component set where these mids are used also have very good reviews, which leads me to believe that these are actually very good candidates for replacement midrange speakers for our cars. Just keep in mind that using this driver would require the use of crossovers (external or built-in, in amps or digital signal processors), with the ability to band-pass these drivers between say 200 and 4500 Hz), and the addition of a tweeter set. If I didn't already have some very good midrange speakers installed, I'd be willing to give these a try!

Does anyone know if the JL Audio C5-400cm fit in the front door panels? From what I read and looking at the specs it looks like they would. Any help would be appriciated.

This is the only spec that matter of that mid:

Quote:

The C5-400cm is designed to operate within a bandwidth of 300 Hz - 5 kHz.

Ideally, a mid with a bandwith that starts at or less than 100Hz would be a much better mid to use in BMW's.

With 300hz mids the woofers will have to cover all the way to, or slightly above, 300Hz. That would not be a problem at all if the woofers were mounted in the front doors, but they are underseat in our cars.

Ideally, a mid with a bandwith that starts at or less than 100Hz would be a much better mid to use in BMW's.

With 300hz mids the woofers will have to cover all the way to, or slightly above, 300Hz. That would not be a problem at all if the woofers were mounted in the front doors, but they are underseat in our cars.

The FS is 124Hz which is quite normal for a 4. I'm sure you can comfortably play this down to 150Hz as long as you use steep slopes. No need to go lower than that anyway, you'd be fighting the laws of physics. The 300Hz number may stem from the crossover setting of the 3-way crossover where this driver is normally used, and/or the manufacturer is just being over-cautious.

The FS is 124Hz which is quite normal for a 4. I'm sure you can comfortably play this down to 150Hz as long as you use steep slopes. No need to go lower than that anyway, you'd be fighting the laws of physics. The 300Hz number may stem from the crossover setting of the 3-way crossover where this driver is normally used, and/or the manufacturer is just being over-cautious.

The output of the head unit only has 4 channels.
If you bought a Technic Harness it should take care of that as far as wiring is concerned I think.
The under seat channels , for bass ,are generated of the front channels
through the amp .

Sorry about the late reply. I got my JL Audio installed with a JL Audio amp. The vocals sound great, miss fill in perfectly and I didn't change the subs. I want to eventually fill in the back stage as I disconnected the rear but it's ok cause I have little kids that sit back there.

I didn't use a clean sweep. One thing I noticed is that I have a loud hissing sound that comes on after I unlock the car. I put gains down but doesn't help. It didn't do it before when just the amp was installed. Any ideas?